How do you decide if something is factual?

[Jimmy D]

Since you were just there, please point me back there to the exact post and I'll try to help you out...I'll try.

LOL, I'm honestly not being deliberately obtuse.

I can't quite fathom what this means...

Everything in my view, but for the purpose of the point....everything beyond what is refered to as the natural.

 

[Aman777]

I don't see how Gen 1:28-31 can count as scientific evidence for anything. Could you explain how those particular passages are scientific evidence?

Sure. The events of those verses have NOT taken place yet. Humankind has NOT yet been given dominion over every living creature, including viruses, mosquitoes and Angels as Gen 1:28 states. Neither has there been a time in the PAST when every living creature was a Vegetarian as Gen 1:30 states. That's because we live today at Gen 1:27 because God is STILL creating people in His Image or in Christ Spiritually. We will not advance to the events at the end of the present 6th Day/Age until AFTER Jesus returns at Armageddon. That's God's Truth Scripturally. God Bless you

 

[Wakalix]

Sure. The events of those verses have NOT taken place yet. Humankind has NOT yet been given dominion over every living creature, including viruses, mosquitoes and Angels as Gen 1:28 states. Neither has there been a time in the PAST when every living creature was a Vegetarian as Gen 1:30 states. That's because we live today at Gen 1:27 because God is STILL creating people in His Image or in Christ Spiritually. We will not advance to the events at the end of the present 6th Day/Age until AFTER Jesus returns at Armageddon. That's God's Truth Scripturally. God Bless you

Just because a connection can be drawn between an ancient book and the physical world does not necessarily mean anything, especially if the book were vague enough. Connections are ridiculously easy to find, regardless of whether or not they reflect a real physical causal interaction.

 

[Kylie]

Right. Religion is a whole other epistemic 'game' than science. So, one will approach one sphere of knowledge not only in separate fashion, but ALSO with a different mode of inquiry.

But isn't the question how well it corresponds to reality?

In the empirical sense, one in which a proposition is demonstrated via the senses, religion (particularly Christianity) will not amend itself.

But it has. Religion has often changed what it says. For example, at one time, a certain passage from the Bible may be considered literal, but later on, that same passage may be considered metaphorical. Once, many people believed that the creation account was literal. Now, the majority of Christians accept it as metaphorical. (Source)

And each time, it has been religion altering its position to better fit with science.

Unlike science, religion has both a human component, in which a person can undertake inquiries, and a 'God' component in which the religious person has to await for God to orchestrate the finality of belief. This may or may not allow some historical claims to be seen as 'facts.' So, religion (again Christianity in particular) will epistemically float somewhere between subjectivity and objectivity. There might be some things that religious people will come to agree is 'factual' about their faith, but there will be other things that they do not agree on, and the nature of the faith will be such that even IF two Christians agree on a 'fact,' this perception may or may not be enjoined by a person who is outside of the faith.

I would say that the "God" component you speak of is usually just a part of the person that they think is God, but otherwise I fairly agree. Religion often takes things that are fact and puts a religious spin on them. It's typical of pretty much all religions. Use the fact parts to show that you are correct, so you can get others to believe the non-fact parts. Basically, getting other people to say, "Well, they were right about this, so I guess they must be right about that too."

The other thing to keep in mind, however, is that if we take seriously various elements of the Nature of Science, we will realize that even with our high-levels of objectivity, facts will still be subject to interpretation and/or other cognitive differences.

But within how much variation? Can you give an example?

Well, you can call it that if you want, but that isn't what it would be. To say that it's just "handwavium" is itself a statement that seems to indicate a tendency to wave away looking into any possible levels of religious cogency. But, correct me on that if I'm wrong.

I think the religious cogency is the handwavium. A system set up so that it can explain away any evidence which would suggest that it is wrong. "We did a scientific study on the efficacy of prayer, and it showed no benefit." "Ah, but the Bible says you can't test God, and that's what you were trying to do, so of course you got those results!"

What excuses. What Eugenie C. Scott provides (again, as an atheist) is no excuse, but the nature of mainstream science [we call it Methodological Naturalism]. Those who adhere to a Philosophical Naturalism (like Dawkins) are in the minority.

I meant the excuses religion offers to explain why evidence from reality doesn't always agree with the claims that religion makes. It is typically religion which makes the claim that the situation is complicated, but I've generally found that this is because it avoids having the discussion and thus avoid presenting a flawed argument. It's also because trying to find an explanation for something that has no rational explanation is about the most complicated thing there is.

Right, because since we start with Methodological Naturalism in our approach to science, we assume for inquiry sake that no God or other supernatural elements are either at play in our experiments or that if they were to exist, they are not controllable variables.

If you want to include God, you'll have to show that God is necessary.

I'm not sure I even understand your statement and questions here. Sorry. You may have to reiterate.

You said, "There is a difference between establishing the truth or falsity of a religious statement, on the one hand, and using hermeneutical considerations to establish the meaning of some religious statement, on the other hand."

I took "the truth or falsity of a religious statement" to mean statements from the Bible (for example) that are taken to be clear unambiguous statements of fact. For example, the Bible claims that Pharaoh kept the Israelites as slaves. This is taken by most Christians to be a statement presented as an objective fact.

And I took "the meaning of some religious statement" as the underlying meaning behind the statement without assuming that the statement is presented as a statement of fact, in much the same way that we can grasp the meaning of Aesop's Fables without assuming that they are telling us that animals really did have those adventures.

So, based on this, I took your reply to mean that there is a difference between establishing that a particular passage is intended as literal truth and establishing that a passage is not literally true, but still has some meaning or message that we are to take from it.

I explained some of this at the top of the post. As far as religion is concerned, and as far as the human side of religion is concerned, if one wants to apply some probability, then that isn't excluded.

When you say "probability" are you talking about the probability that something is true, or are you saying that there are different amounts of truthfullness?

As an example, if we compare it to coin flips, we can say that there is a particular probability that the coin is heads, but we can't say that it is 30% heads and 70% tails. It is either completely one or the other.

The caveat is that is Christianity is true, then by definition our human inquiries will be curtailed and/or affected by God Himself, unlike in mainline science.

If Christianity is true, then any effect God has on the real world will be measurable.

And let's also say this:

If God intervenes to ensure that a particular outcome occurs, then we can assume that God's intervention is required because there was no other way for that outcome to occur UNLESS God intervened. That would mean that such an outcome is impossible according to the laws of nature.

Therefore, any intervention of God in our reality will show as a violation of the laws of nature.

And so I conclude that if Christianity is real and God intervenes in any way, then we should see the laws of nature being violated. I'm not aware of any such examples.

By the way, just so we're clear, I'm an adherent of the BioLogos approach to Christian faith and science, and not an advocate of the Intelligent Design or Creation Science approaches.

 

[Kylie]

Sure. The events of those verses have NOT taken place yet. Humankind has NOT yet been given dominion over every living creature, including viruses, mosquitoes and Angels as Gen 1:28 states. Neither has there been a time in the PAST when every living creature was a Vegetarian as Gen 1:30 states. That's because we live today at Gen 1:27 because God is STILL creating people in His Image or in Christ Spiritually. We will not advance to the events at the end of the present 6th Day/Age until AFTER Jesus returns at Armageddon. That's God's Truth Scripturally. God Bless you

Claiming that something in the Bible has not yet happened, but assuring us that it will happen some day is NOT scientific evidence.

 

[Aman777]

Claiming that something in the Bible has not yet happened, but assuring us that it will happen some day is NOT scientific evidence.

The events of the last days have already begun. Here's an example:

Universal ancestor of all life on Earth was only half alive...
Jul 25, 2016 -

Notice the date. Then read the following verse written 3k years ago.

Gen 1:21 And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after Their kind, and every winged fowl after His kind: and God saw that it was good.

Science and Scripture AGREE. Only God knew and wrote this so long ago.

 

[Subduction Zone]

The events of the last days have already begun. Here's an example:

Universal ancestor of all life on Earth was only half alive...
Jul 25, 2016 -

Notice the date. Then read the following verse written 3k years ago.

Gen 1:21 And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after Their kind, and every winged fowl after His kind: and God saw that it was good.

Science and Scripture AGREE. Only God knew and wrote this so long ago.

This error of yours has been explained to you countless times. Reinterpreting the Bible after the fact is worthless in a debate.

 

[Kylie]

The events of the last days have already begun. Here's an example:

Universal ancestor of all life on Earth was only half alive...
Jul 25, 2016 -

Notice the date.

First of all, this is in direct contradiction with the Bible. If you want to say this is acceptable evidence, you must also give up a literal interpretation of the creation in Genesis.

Secondly, just because the article was written then does not mean that before that scientists had no idea that life most likely started in water. For example, here's an article on Pubmed that discusses water as being required for life from 1993 - a full 23 years BEFORE your source.

There was the Urey-Miller experiment back in the 1950s which shows that scientists considered water to be the environment in which life first appeared.

And Charles Darwin described a "warm little pond" as an origin of life back in 1871!

So don't give me any of that "Oh, they didn't know until 2016" nonsense.

Then read the following verse written 3k years ago.

Gen 1:21 And God created great whales, and every living creature that moveth, which the waters brought forth abundantly, after Their kind, and every winged fowl after His kind: and God saw that it was good.

Science and Scripture AGREE. Only God knew and wrote this so long ago.

So when the Bible says, "And God said, Let the EARTH bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so", what does that mean? Does "earth" mean "water" as well?

Of course, reading the two passages, it sounds to me that the Bible is saying that whales, fish, sea life and birds came from the water, but other animals like cattle, beasts, creeping things etc came from the Earth. So even the Bible you hold up as agreeing with science claims that some kinds of life had a completely different origins to others (some from water, some from earth), which shows that your claim is wrong on two counts! Namely, your claim that the Bible says all life came from the water, and your claim that science and the Bible agree.

 

[Aman777]

First of all, this is in direct contradiction with the Bible. If you want to say this is acceptable evidence, you must also give up a literal interpretation of the creation in Genesis.

Not so since Gen 1:21 states that God created and brought forth from WATER, every living creature. Science AGREES literally.

*** Secondly, just because the article was written then does not mean that before that scientists had no idea that life most likely started in water. For example, here's an article on Pubmed that discusses water as being required for life from 1993 - a full 23 years BEFORE your source.

There was the Urey-Miller experiment back in the 1950s which shows that scientists considered water to be the environment in which life first appeared.

Amen but God told us this 3k years ago and it's not just a coincidence since He hid His scientific Truth in Genesis chapter One in many places.

*** And Charles Darwin described a "warm little pond" as an origin of life back in 1871!

So don't give me any of that "Oh, they didn't know until 2016" nonsense.

Science didn't come to a consensus until July 25, 2016. God knew it long before.

*** So when the Bible says, "And God said, Let the EARTH bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so", what does that mean? Does "earth" mean "water" as well?

No. It's a command to Jesus to bring forth TEMPORARILY (subject to death) from the dust of the ground, cattle, creeping things, beasts of the Earth and birds. He has already formed Adam (mankind) on the 3rd Day.

*** Of course, reading the two passages, it sounds to me that the Bible is saying that whales, fish, sea life and birds came from the water, but other animals like cattle, beasts, creeping things etc came from the Earth. So even the Bible you hold up as agreeing with science claims that some kinds of life had a completely different origins to others (some from water, some from earth), which shows that your claim is wrong on two counts! Namely, your claim that the Bible says all life came from the water, and your claim that science and the Bible agree.

Amen, since the living creature Jesus made (His kinds) are temporary and subject to death. God (Elohim-The Trinity) kinds (Their kinds) are ETERNAL, which means they will be in Heaven FOREVER. Amen?

 

[Kenny'sID]

LOL, I'm honestly not being deliberately obtuse.

I can't quite fathom what this means...

I've concluded you probably are not and either my comment is lacking or it's something else, but not worth getting into all that..

Everything in my view, but for the purpose of the point....everything beyond what is refered to as the natural.

"Everything", meaning everything *was* created in my view, but since I know you all don't believe that, I commented only on what you do believe, that everything beyond the natural (everything that man made was created)

And of course my point was because that's the only way I know of that something can be created. And since we aren't intelligent enough to understand, much less create the natural (everything we didn't create) it must have been created by what I know as "God".

A simple logical process/conclusion that makes perfect sense to me, and if I may, IMO, a conclusion that could only *not* make sense if one chose not to let it.

 

[Jimmy D]

I've concluded you probably are not and either my comment is lacking or it's something else, but not worth getting into all that..

Everything in my view, but for the purpose of the point....everything beyond what is refered to as the natural.

"Everything", meaning everything *was* created in my view, but since I know you all don't believe that, I commented only on what you do believe, that everything beyond the natural (everything that man made was created)

And of course my point was because that's the only way I know of that something can be created. And since we aren't intelligent enough to understand, much less create the natural (everything we didn't create) it must have been created by what I know as "God".

A simple logical process/conclusion that makes perfect sense to me, and if I may, IMO, a conclusion that could only *not* make sense if one chose not to let it.

Got you now, sorry about that.

I don't agree though, not surprisingly.

 

[tas8831]

I did look at the link when you posted it. The same information from 10 or more years ago could have been seen by many, so what...and I never claimed that this was my information.

Right - you just gave no indication that it was not. So odd that two people would pick the same couple of genes from a source, copy/paste them, but only 1 of them would provide a source while the other changed a couple of words to make it appear to be original.

I know about such folk.

When realizing that a difference in a single base pair can cause major differences in form or function this becomes significant when using words such a similar or same (which become weasel words).

While it is true that a single bp can make a difference, it is also true that hundreds do not necessarily do so.

The only weasel words I see are coming from creationists who seem to think plagiarism is OK.

You do not seem to understand the relevance of the compared sequences. My gosh - you still think that the SAME GENES cannot be homologous because they are not the exact same length - this despite a supposed 30 years of reading and lab work!

AND despite the fact that, as i indicated, I found multiple version of the human gene that you copy/pasted - does that mean THEY cannot be 'related'?

Or does the creationist not bother herself with such logical conclusions based on their assertions?

We see the same DIFFERENCE between what we can actually observe and what we are told with the gulo gene. The sequences have been recorded for a number of creatures. The Human is more akin to the macaque in some areas and more akin to the gorilla in others but bottom line is it is different (in base pairs and function...in humans appearing to have none). They are all closer to each other than to humans (yet also differ to one another).

Why mention gulo? More weasel words and obfuscation?

By the way...in many posts you have said things and even given data without claiming credit that were not YOUR information that had no links but what does that have to do with the OP?

I provided information from memory, that is true.

Unlike you, I do not and did not and have not copied and pasted the words of others without indicating that I did so so as to make it appear that I am more well-versed on a subject than I actually am. That is dishonest.

In such cases did I try to rabidly attack your person or character?

Why would you have done so since I did not plagiarize?

Look, I get it that you've been found out and your facade of superior knowledge is crumbling, and this hurts, but that its what happens when people misrepresent themselves in order to support their anti-science belief system.

No! Yawn! This type of rant is so typical I laugh...you strain at the gnat but swallow the camel whole and strive to find any gnat you can...Ah ha ha ha....it hillarious [sic].

Right - it is a pity that you must rely on plagiarism to make up for your lack of relevant knowledge, then try to cover it up with excessive, often off-topic verbiage, all to support your beliefs, but don't take it out on me when you get caught.

And you are still running away from the fact that I discovered that you doctored the Blum quote - and I have to say, I have only scratched the surface. It reveals much. You may find it "hillarious", but I should have thought that a Christian would exhibit a bit more humility.

 

[Tolworth John]

Aesop's fables is prose as well, so does that mean those stories are a description of what happened?

You can't just assume prose = real and poetry = metaphor.

The difference is one sets out to tell a history, while the other set out to tell a story which is not true, but does teach a moral.

You struggle to accept that the supernatural exists, yet accept the Christian ideas of a reasonable, consitent universe and the non mateial things like logic, and morality.
As well as the unexplainably like where does information come from.

 

[2PhiloVoid]

But isn't the question how well it corresponds to reality?

You do realize that this question of yours is philosophically loaded, don't you, Kylie? It's especially so if our goal is to get a glimpse under the hood of the Christian faith as opposed to observing the love lives of algae.

While we could get into the whys and wherefores of how Christian faith compares to the epistemic contours of Scientific Investigation, I think I've already laid out the general premise(s) by which you can understand how I approach my own faith. And since I'm not sure you're really interested in being convinced by any of it, I don't know that it would be a good investment of my time to try to further spell this out for you.

What specifically do you want to know? I hope this thread isn't really a 'pose' to get us Christians into a position that is easier to knock over. I've never been one to really liked playing the "Whack a Mole" game at the kiddie pizza place, especially if I played it while envisioning myself as one of the moles. But, I'll leave it up to you as to how you want to proceed. Personally, I'd rather not attempt to rewrite all of the exposition on these things already written by the experts and who have articulated it much better than I probably ever could.

So, what do you really want? Do you want me to proceed and attempt to answer questions for your sake? Or will this be an exercise in playing "Cat-and-Mouse."?

No, this isn't a cop-out. It's a "mouse-out."

Peace,
2PhiloVoid

 

[FrumiousBandersnatch]

Just because a connection can be drawn between an ancient book and the physical world does not necessarily mean anything, especially if the book were vague enough. Connections are ridiculously easy to find, regardless of whether or not they reflect a real physical causal interaction.

Are you trying to tell me Nostradamus didn't prophesy all the major events of the 20th century??

 

[Kylie]

Not so since Gen 1:21 states that God created and brought forth from WATER, every living creature. Science AGREES literally.

*** Secondly, just because the article was written then does not mean that before that scientists had no idea that life most likely started in water. For example, here's an article on Pubmed that discusses water as being required for life from 1993 - a full 23 years BEFORE your source.

There was the Urey-Miller experiment back in the 1950s which shows that scientists considered water to be the environment in which life first appeared.

Amen but God told us this 3k years ago and it's not just a coincidence since He hid His scientific Truth in Genesis chapter One in many places.

*** And Charles Darwin described a "warm little pond" as an origin of life back in 1871!

So don't give me any of that "Oh, they didn't know until 2016" nonsense.

Science didn't come to a consensus until July 25, 2016. God knew it long before.

*** So when the Bible says, "And God said, Let the EARTH bring forth the living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth after his kind: and it was so", what does that mean? Does "earth" mean "water" as well?

No. It's a command to Jesus to bring forth TEMPORARILY (subject to death) from the dust of the ground, cattle, creeping things, beasts of the Earth and birds. He has already formed Adam (mankind) on the 3rd Day.

*** Of course, reading the two passages, it sounds to me that the Bible is saying that whales, fish, sea life and birds came from the water, but other animals like cattle, beasts, creeping things etc came from the Earth. So even the Bible you hold up as agreeing with science claims that some kinds of life had a completely different origins to others (some from water, some from earth), which shows that your claim is wrong on two counts! Namely, your claim that the Bible says all life came from the water, and your claim that science and the Bible agree.

Amen, since the living creature Jesus made (His kinds) are temporary and subject to death. God (Elohim-The Trinity) kinds (Their kinds) are ETERNAL, which means they will be in Heaven FOREVER. Amen?

Dude, again, learn to use the quote function. It's there for a reason.

 

[Kylie]

The difference is one sets out to tell a history, while the other set out to tell a story which is not true, but does teach a moral.

So the Bible is actual history, and Aesop's Fables are not true, just designed to teach a moral, huh?

You struggle to accept that the supernatural exists, yet accept the Christian ideas of a reasonable, consitent universe and the non mateial things like logic, and morality.
As well as the unexplainably like where does information come from.

Care to show me how the claims of a "reasonable, consistent universe and the non material things like logic, and morality, as well as the explainable like where does information come from" are Christian in origin?

 

[Kylie]

You do realize that this question of yours is philosophically loaded, don't you, Kylie? It's especially so if our goal is to get a glimpse under the hood of the Christian faith as opposed to observing the love lives of algae.

I am simply saying that the ultimate test of any worldview that seeks to describe reality is how well that worldview corresponds to reality.

While we could get into the whys and wherefores of how Christian faith compares to the epistemic contours of Scientific Investigation, I think I've already laid out the general premise(s) by which you can understand how I approach my own faith. And since I'm not sure you're really interested in being convinced by any of it, I don't know that it would be a good investment of my time to try to further spell this out for you.

What specifically do you want to know? I hope this thread isn't really a 'pose' to get us Christians into a position that is easier to knock over. I've never been one to really liked playing the "Whack a Mole" game at the kiddie pizza place, especially if I played it while envisioning myself as one of the moles. But, I'll leave it up to you as to how you want to proceed. Personally, I'd rather not attempt to rewrite all of the exposition on these things already written by the experts and who have articulated it much better than I probably ever could.

So, what do you really want? Do you want me to proceed and attempt to answer questions for your sake? Or will this be an exercise in playing "Cat-and-Mouse."?

No, this isn't a cop-out. It's a "mouse-out."

Peace,
2PhiloVoid

If you can show me that your religious viewpoint can explain reality better than my own viewpoint can, then I am certainly most interested in hearing about it. But first you will need to demonstrate that it does actually explain reality better than mine.

Really, that's all it is.

 

[Wakalix]

How dare you try to force that philosophical position onto theists! They are free to say that "truth" means "makes me happy" if they want to, you fascist.

 

[AV1611VET]

... you fascist.

Interesting word choice, in view of: 1